It had been a long day. All of them had been long days since Alice had gotten back, a brace of survivors on her heels and a new set of prosthetics on her right hand and the urge to stay getting stronger and stronger until maybe it could wrestle down the ever-present thought of running.

But Alice could take the days being long and full of work, infighting, all the bullshit that came with Claire putting her in charge of the militia. Because the nights were short. The nights were peaceful. The nights were Claire's.

It'd been about two weeks and the urge to ravish Claire like she was starving for it exactly as much as she was had been wrestled down by knowing how tired Claire was. It was a particularly stressful time for her, trying to integrate Alice's new batch into this latest tribe of hers. In a way, the cure was worse than the disease. With zombies, everyone had at least been united. Now they were waiting for the other shoe to drop. Tempers frayed, people got into fights, and Claire had to be the adult. Keep people from throwing fists, or making the equivalent in policy decisions that were just as bad.

Christ, pretty soon they'd want to start holding elections…

So Alice contented herself with just being able to hold Claire at night and talk about something other than the dead—it was a lot of contentment for her. She just hoped it was enough for Claire.

When the door squeaked open, Alice tensed, readied herself as much as she could without moving at all, her hand tightening on Claire's waist to wake her into silence. It was Claire's hand on hers that extolled her to relax. The padding footsteps were just K-Mart. She hadn't been able to sleep right all the way to Raccoon City—needing Claire to feel safe as much as Alice did. Alice guessed she still couldn't sleep right.

"Can I stay with you tonight?" she asked, breathing a sigh of relief to see that they were still mostly dressed, ready to jump into action if roused. Sleeping skin to skin was still a luxury they hesitated to indulge in.

Under the sheets, Claire's fingers touched Alice's thigh—a question. Claire wouldn't mind being nightmare deterrent for one of the few among them young enough to admit to needing it. She'd told Alice often enough about how Chris had done the same for her. But she'd leave it up to Alice without making Alice the bad guy.

"It's fine," Alice said. "I haven't had any nightmares since I started sleeping with Claire. Couldn't hoard that forever."

"You absolutely can," Claire retorted, scooting away from Alice to open up a space for K-Mart. It was still a small bed, and wispy as she was, K-Mart still pushed Alice nearly to the edge making room for her. Bigger bed, Alice told herself. One of the other million things she had to do tomorrow.

She watched as K-Mart cuddled up to Claire, who cradled her gently—and then beckoned to Alice. There was plenty of room for Alice to sandwich her in, Claire seemed to say.

I'll only scare her, Alice mouthed, and Claire mouthed back a succinct fuck you before jerking her head over. Alice couldn't turn down an invitation like that. She sidled into K-Mart's back, now directly across from Claire, and felt the kid relax, relax, relax into the pillow of Claire's body.

It still amazed Alice how Claire could be so maternal. Such a mom. Maybe it was how she herself had been half a person—a killing machine and barely anything else until she'd gotten the memories to place all her strange, foreign feelings into a kind of context. Been able to realize what Claire meant to her besides the sex and the desperate urge to protect her, been almost able to put into words what Claire meant to her, only to have the redhead tell her she already knew.

But Claire was the best warrior Alice knew and still somehow someone who could exchange a friendly word with an acquaintance, bring someone yogurt if she saw they hadn't been eating, know what to say and when to touch and how to live. Be able to give Alice peace when there was barely any of that left.

K-Mart was snoring. Claire gave her peace too. Hell, she gave it to all of them. And who of any of them could give it to her?

Alice had left thinking her job wasn't done, that she still hadn't done enough to work her way out from under her legacy. But maybe she was a new person now, with Alicia's memories, and that person was meant for something other than guns and blood. Maybe her mission was to take care of this woman, this amazing woman, so she could take care of everyone else.

Maybe she should just go to sleep.

"Was that okay, what happened last night?" Claire asked. Loading shotgun shells into long guns and bandoliers while wearing a tanktop tended to make one look butch—less so when there'd been a teenager drooling against you all night.

"What happened last night?" Alice teased, sorting through the boxes of shells to check they were in good condition before giving them to Claire. Maybe they used the guns for hunting now instead of zombies, but that wouldn't make much of a difference if one blew up in someone's face.

"I know you didn't sign up for… Claire the mother…"

"I signed up for Claire," Alice said, "period."

"I know, I know. I think between the last two times you saved my life, I got the idea that you were hopelessly in love."

Alice smiled at her. "Hopeless doesn't quite cover it. There's despair in my love for you. Ennui."

"Please don't tell me you were cloned from a French woman." Claire held up a hand to ward off another comeback. "I just thought, maybe, what with Becky…"

Alice looked away. "We're going to find her."

Claire pumped her shotgun, locking the final shell into place as she crossed to Alice, setting it aside before she embraced her. Mom friend, Alice thought, with a scatter-gun. "I know we are. Just like we found K-Mart… just like I found you. But you seemed a little uncomfortable, and I know you. I know you. If something's bothering you, I don't want you to keep quiet just because…"

"Just because K-Mart is a traumatized seventeen-year-old girl and sometimes the only thing that gets her through the night is knowing you're there to protect her?" Alice asked. "Claire, do you really think I'd ever see that as a negative? I love that about you. I love that you can be this warm, nurturing, supportive person…"

"And you're not?" Claire retorted.

Alice picked up the shotgun and gave it an easy twirl. "It's not my strong suit."

"Maybe it could be. She slept in your bed too, y'know."

"No, it was you. And I love that it's you." Alice stood, feeling the tingle of her closeness to Claire, the tingle that made her wonder how she could ever not be touching this woman. Made her want to go with her everywhere, just hold her hand and never let go. "You want to know what bothered me? It's that you'd make such a great mom. And I think if it hadn't been for this plague, you would've found some nice guy, and he'd have gotten you pregnant, and you'd have had this nice normal life and you would've been so good at it. And instead you have… this. You have to settle for… all of this."

"For you?"

Alice shrugged.

Then she saw the fond exasperation in Claire's eyes, the urge to simply laugh at how emotionally locked down Alice was, were it not for what they were talking about. "I don't settle for anything, Alice. Not ever." She put her hand on Alice's chest, as if making sure her heart was beating when Alice didn't know. "This is what I want. I wanted it and I got it. You didn't take me away from anything. You saved me."

"I still wish…" Alice looked down at Claire's hand, strong and steady over her breast. "God, I wish I could give you a baby."

"You gave me a family. It's going to be you, and me, and K-Mart, and Becky… do you think it matters in the slightest to me whether I gave birth to them?" She moved her hand up to Alice's face. "Do you think it matters to me that you're a clone?"

"No. But I still wish I wasn't. I still wish I could give you…" Alice raised her hands before lowering them weakly. "I'm some hodgepodge of fake memories and real memories and someone else's memories. I don't even have a name."

"Your name is Alice."

"No one gave me that name. Not really." Alice could feel that weird emotion between sadness and hysteria, a kind of panic that filled her eyes with tears but didn't let them fall. She was used to clamping down on it, letting it pass over her in waves when she was alone—everyone had their traumas. She hated that Claire was seeing it… getting one more thing to worry about. "I don't know what to say when I'm with you. There are so many times I don't even know what to say…"

"You don't have to say anything."

"I do!" Alice shouted, but Claire's stroking hand on her cheek quieted her. "I do," she said again, softly. "You deserve to have someone tell you how beautiful you are, and how much you mean to me, and all I can tell you is that you feel like… you feel like when Alicia was a child, and her parents were with her, and nothing bad could happen to her. She never felt that way again, but you make me feel like that all the time. All I have is someone else's memories to tell you what you are to me."

"Alice… you got your memories back and all you care about is using them to find a way to tell me how much I matter to you." Claire smiled gently. "Do you really think I'd trade that for anything else, in any other life?"

"No." Alice smiled back weakly. "Tell me you wouldn't anyway?"

Claire embraced her, holding her much the same way she'd held K-Mart, and Alice found it just as comforting. "You," Claire said. "Over any other life. Over any other person. Just you for me."

"You for me," Alice repeated happily, grinding her chin into Claire's shoulder. "Let's go to bed."

"Alice, it's two in the afternoon."

"Yeah," Alice agreed. "And I really doubt K-Mart is having any nightmares in school."

"So you're saying we should stop by… ten?" Claire teased.

"Eleven," Alice countered. "K-Mart's a night-owl."

There was no way they could avoid their responsibilities for that long, but it was a lovely thought. A lovely, lovely thought.